Rapid response

Supermarket chains also responded rapidly to ensure daily supplies for downtown areas.

For example, Beijing Jingkelong Supermarket Chain Co tripled direct purchases of vegetables from Hebei and Shandong provinces, ensuring stable and orderly food supplies in the capital.

Some cities in neighboring Hebei province have also taken steps to increase supplies of agricultural produce to Beijing.

Hebei Xinfadi, an agricultural produce wholesale market owned by the Xinfadi group in Gaobeidian, Baoding, has set up a 50 million yuan fund to organize and allocate farm produce needed urgently in Beijing.

"Produce being transported that was originally destined for Beijing can be transferred to Hebei Xinfadi," a notice issued by Hebei Xinfadi Agricultural Products Co stated.

The Xinfadi market in Beijing is among Hebei Xinfadi's shareholders, but the two venues have their own suppliers.

In Beijing's Xicheng district, implementation of an emergency plan is ensuring that food supplies reach the public. A temporary stock house has been set up to deliver vegetables directly to the capital from Hebei and Shandong provinces and Inner Mongolia autonomous region.

In Chaoyang district, online and offline platforms are being used to supply produce to the city, while many supermarkets have capped vegetable prices and promised not to raise them for the time being.

Meanwhile, the Xinfadi market remains closed and is being fully disinfected. The huge trading area stands eerily quiet, and it is hard to imagine just how busy it was.

However, Wang, the restaurant owner, said he believes it will soon become just as noisy as before.